I Am Brian Wilson: A Memoir Reviewed By Dr. Wesley Britton of Bookpleasures.com

Dr. Wesley Britton

Reviewer Dr. Wesley
Britton: Dr. Britton is the author of four non-fiction books on
espionage in literature and the media. Starting in fall 2015, his new
six-book science fiction series, The Beta-Earth Chronicles, debuted
via BearManor Media. For seven years, he was co-host of online
radio’s Dave White Presents where he contributed interviews with a
host of entertainment insiders. Before his retirement in 2016, Dr.
Britton taught English at Harrisburg Area Community College. Learn
more about Dr. Britton at hisWEBSITE

Last fall, two Beach Boy
autobiographies came out nearly simultaneously, I Am Brian Wilson and
Good Vibrations: My Life as a Beach Boy by Mike Love. In November,
I reviewed Love’s offering, saying it was a needed corrective to
much of the mythology that surrounds his role in the group. I wonder
now how much correction went on in that book.

Now that I’m finally
getting around to reviewing I am Brian Wilson, I’m not thinking
about comparing it to Love’s memoir but rather Wouldn’t It Be
Nice: My Own Story, Wilson’s controversial 1991 first
autobiography. Quickly following its publication, that book was
damned on a number of fronts including charges of plagiarism and
misrepresentations of facts, especially as presented in a lawsuit
filed by Love. Some critics still claimed the book has very useful
material even if the stories need to be filtered before being
accepted. Wilson himself completely disowned the book.

I have vivid memories of
reading Wouldn’t It Be Nice which I, at the time, felt was a very
poignant and tragic account of the Brian Wilson saga. So, as I read I
Am, comparisons quickly sprang to my mind. For one matter, father
Murray Wilson came off as little more than a torturing, vicious
monster in the first memoir; in the second book, Brian gives him a
much more balanced treatment while admitting he still finds it
difficult to write about his father. In Wouldn’t, Brian—or
perhaps his collaborator—blasted then girlfriend or maybe just
housemate Caroline saying she was taking advantage of him. In the new
book, Brian simply says in one sentence that she was forced out of
his life even though “she did nothing wrong.”

For me, the most
noticeable difference was that the first account sang the praises of
therapist Eugene Landy, with a vigorous defense of
his extreme treatments. On the other hand, I Am is nearly a
wall-to-wall damnation of Landy’s relentless domination of Brian
which seems to have been far more damaging to Brian than all of Murry
Wilson’s attempts to control his children.

When I reviewed Good
Vibrations, I noted Mike Love had virtually nothing to say about
fellow Beach Boy, Al Jardine. Well, Brian too talks mostly about
himself and his brothers Carl and Dennis, with little about either Al
or Mike. Reportedly, Love isn’t convinced anything Wilson said
about him in the book necessarily came from Wilson himself.
Apparently, as of last November, he hadn’t even read the book.
Perhaps, with possible lawsuits in mind, Wilson opted to simply not
talk about Love but rather made a point of tossing out songwriting
credits to a number of other lyrical collaborators. Perhaps, this
time, Love will leave Brian alone, that is, stay out of court for a
change.

Whether or not you’ve
read any previous Beach Boy books, by founding members or not, odds
are the majority of any new revelations you’ll gain from I Am Brian
Wilson will deal with Wilson’s solo projects from the past two
decades. It’s an engaging read which gratefully doesn’t follow a
strict, linear, chronological flow. As we go along, readers get
detailed insights into the distant past as well as the more recent
decades which means we do hear stories and perspectives not beaten to
death in other books, interviews, or articles. Still, it helps to be
a Beach Boy diehard to dive into this one—or perhaps this might be
a interesting read if this is the first Beach Boy book you’ve ever
read. Or, it might be a good update if all you’ve heard about is
the history of the Beach Boys through the deaths of Carl and Dennis
Wilson. In short, a decent but not indispensable read.